Showing results by narrator "Johnny Rey Diaz" in All Categories

Grieving mother Magos cuts out a piece of her deceased eleven-year-old son Santiago's lung. Acting on fierce maternal instinct and the dubious logic of an old folktale, she nurtures the lung until it gains sentience, growing into the carnivorous little Monstrilio she keeps hidden within the walls of her family's decaying Mexico City estate. Eventually, Monstrilio begins to resemble the Santiago he once was, but his innate impulses—though curbed by his biological and chosen family's communal care—threaten to destroy this fragile second chance at life.

The prestigious annual story anthology, featuring prize-winning stories by Kate DiCamillo, Jess Walter, Dave Eggers, Allegra Goodman, Jai Chakrabarti, Francisco Gonzalez, and more.

Rain of Gold is a true-life saga of love, family and destiny that pulses with bold vitality, sweeping from the war-ravaged Mexican mountains of Pancho Villa's revolution to the days of Prohibition in California.

Larry Boyd just found the coolest thing in the trash. It's an old bottle of INSTA-TAN. "Rub on a dark suntan in minutes"—that's what the label says. So Larry and his friends do. But nothing much happens. Until Larry notices the hair. Dark spiky hair growing on his hands and face. Really gross shiny hair. Hair that keeps growing back even after he shaves it off...

“Without stories, we cannot live well,” shares guest editor Min Jin Lee, describing how storytelling affects and nurtures readers. The Best American Short Stories 2023 features twenty pieces of short fiction that reflect a world full of fractured relationships, but also wondrous hope. A lifelong friendship may become a casualty of the Russia-Ukraine war. Rejected by his lover, a man seeks to reconcile with his family. Twitter users miraculously muster enough empathy to help a lost cat find a forever home.

"In almost any culture, at any time, you can find food writing,” writes guest editor Mark Bittman in his introduction. “Food means growing and hardship, and health and medicine, and work and holiday. In its abundance it is a gift and a joy, and in its absence a curse and a tragedy. If a culture has writing, that culture has food writing.” The stories in this year’s Best American Food Writing are brilliant, eye-opening windows into the heart of our country’s culture.

“What's most compelling about a scientific story is the way it challenges us to think about the concepts we take for granted,” writes guest editor Carl Zimmer in his introduction. The essays in this year’s Best American Science and Nature Writing probe at the ordinary and urge us to think more deeply about our place in the world around us.

We all need help centering ourselves to serve ourselves and our world. In this small, beautiful book, the Kogi—a remote and ancient tribe in the mountains of Colombia—offer their learnings. They pose nine provocative questions to help people around the planet to spiritual peace.

An immersive, historical novel based on true events: In 1938, Orson Welles's legendary radio dramatization of H.G. Wells's novel The War of the Worlds terrified Americans into believing Martians were invading. Eleven years later, an Ecuadorian radio station adapted the show—with catastrophic consequences. Now, two young journalists are determined to uncover what really happened to their families that night—even as secrets endanger their future.

Driven and recklessly daring, Martin Sabater follows his lifelong dream of owning a cacao plantation in Valle del Cauca. But on the night of a spectacular gala, he disappears—and is never seen again. Now his hacienda is a budding Catholic hospital saving lives during an emerging epidemic. And novice nun “Sor Puri” is there to uncover the truth behind Martin’s disappearance. But her real identity—and her past with the heartbreakingly charismatic Martin—will put far more than her perilous search at risk.

In modern-day Mexico, Sitlali has no family left and has caught the attention of a gang leader. She has no choice but to make the perilous trip to the US border and track down her long-absent father. The night before her journey, she finds a conch shell detailed with ancient markings. In 1521, Calizto is an Aztec young warrior in Tenochtitlan, fighting to save his city from Spanish imperialists. With his family dead and the horrors of war surrounding him, Calizto asks a sacred moon conch for guidance. Connected by the magical conch, Sitlali and Calizto can communicate across centuries.

In this rare account from within ICE detention facilities, 14 children are followed from their arrest by US Border Patrol to the day they exit facilities for unaccompanied minors. Preschoolers and teenagers, the kids offer a range of evocative backstories: A deaf and mute 15-year-old Mayan girl; a teen from India who has walked 3000 miles; a Guatemalan girl who has escaped domestic slavery and is on the run with her young siblings. Each child offers an account of their chaotic journey and the situation that drove them to enter the US illegally.

In the 1950s, tensions remain high in the border town of La Frontera. Penny loafers and sneakers clash with boots and huaraches. Bowling shirts and leather jackets compete with guayaberas. Convertibles fend with motorcycles. Yet amidst the discord, young love blooms at first sight between Fulgencio Ramirez, the son of impoverished immigrants, and Carolina Mendelssohn, the local pharmacist’s daughter. But as they’ll soon find out, their bonds will be undone by a force more powerful than they could have known.

Three teenagers are traveling northeast in a navy blue Ford pickup. Turi fled his abusive family at the border to see the beautiful New England landscape he’s always dreamed about. Arnulfo is undocumented and wants only to find someplace safe and quiet. Molly seeks a new life far away from her nowhere Missouri town. Turi and Arnulfo are best friends. Molly and Turi are falling in love. But for all their innocence, violence follows the trio at every turn.

Eighteen-year-old Joaquín del Toro’s future looks bright. With his older brother in the priesthood, he’s set to inherit his family’s Texas ranch. He’s in love with Dulceña—and she’s in love with him. But it’s 1915, and trouble has been brewing along the US-Mexico border. On one side, the Mexican Revolution is taking hold; on the other, Texas Rangers fight Tejano insurgents, and ordinary citizens are caught in the middle. As tensions grow, Joaquín is torn away from Dulceña, whose father’s critical reporting on the Rangers in the local newspaper has driven a wedge between their families.

Roberto Clemente always loved baseball. Growing up in Carolina, Puerto Rico, he swung tree branches (since he didn’t have a bat) and hit tin cans. He was always batting, pitching, running, sliding. His dedication paid off when, at the age of 19, he was tapped for a major league team. First stop: chilly Montreal . . . where he warmed the bench and himself, longing to play baseball. Months later, he finally got his chance with the Pittsburgh Pirates.

Two intertwining stories of Bogotá. One, a family of five children, left to live on their own. The other, a girl in an orphanage who will do anything to befriend the mysterious Immortal Boy. How they weave together will never leave you.

Emilia and Gregorio spent their childhood following their grandmother through the mountains of central México, gathering the ingredients she used for curandera work and learning about the supernatural world. When she passes away, the siblings are left alone. So they scrape together their money and pay coyotes to smuggle them to their father in the United States. The siblings are exhausted before they even reach the border, where the coyotes seize Emilia for their own harsh ends.

Blanca Montes wants to make a difference in the world, to do more than her wealthy godfather and spoiled boyfriend think her capable of. So when Greg Chan shows up as a new student at her Nevada school, she is more than intrigued by this handsome, brilliant stranger. But Greg and Blanca are drawn to each other by something stronger--their fates entwined centuries ago. In his first life, Greg was Captain Popoca, and Blanca is the reincarnation of Princess Iztac, who took her own life after believing her beloved Popoca was sent to his death in battle.